Navy Secretary Ray Mabus has spent years ordering the Navy and Marine Corps to jettison female specific uniform styles as a way to ensure women don’t feel apart from their male peers.
As part of this, women are now set to wear service dress blue jumpers, the Dixie cup, choker whites and much else instead of the separate styles that women have worn for decades. But some have questioned the top-down push, which has received a mixture of reactions.
At a public appearance Wednesday, Mabus defended this push in a response to a female officer, who asked him what he was trying to accomplish.
“I think wearing different uniforms has segregated women, sometimes in not good ways,” Mabus said. “If we ask any other group to wear a different uniform, can you imagine the outcry?”
In fact, he added, the female dress uniforms are “sort of a historical accident” dating back to World War II.
